Overview
- House Oversight, which released the transcript Wednesday, detailed Howard Lutnick’s closed-door interview where he called his Epstein contacts “virtually nonexistent” and “meaningless and inconsequential.”
- Lutnick said he met Epstein three times: a 2005 coffee at the New York townhouse where a “right kind of massage” remark led him to leave, a brief 2011 hallway chat about scaffolding, and a 2012 family lunch on Epstein’s island where he said he saw no young women or girls.
- Justice Department files documented emails, calendar invites, a photo from the island, and overlapping investment in the ad tech firm AdFin after 2005, contradicting Lutnick’s earlier public claim that he cut ties.
- He told lawmakers he could not recall when he learned Epstein was a registered sex offender and said his past comment that Epstein used “blackmail” was speculation made for a podcast.
- Democrats called his answers evasive and some urged him to resign, the White House voiced confidence in him, and the Oversight probe is pressing ahead with more witness interviews, including former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi later this month.